2012 Second International Conference on Instrumentation & Measurement, Computer, Communication and Control
PID vs. MRAC Control Techniques Applied to a Quadrotor’s
Yong Zeng, Qiang Jiang, Qiang Liu, Hua Jing
School of Aeronautics and Astronautics, UESTC
Chengdu, China
E-mail :zengyong5868@126.com, jiangqiang871108@126.com
$EVWUDFW Attitude is the key parameters for a
Quadrotor. This paper designed a Proportional Integral
Differential (PID) controller and a Model Reference
Adaptive Control (MRAC) controller for a Quadrotor.
At the end, a simulation was introduced. The simulation
result told that MRAC controller had the ability to avoid
the noise with the power such as 0.01.
.H\ZRUGV: Quadrotor, PID, MRAC.
I. INTRODUCTION
Recently, the MEMS techniques make the
development of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)
possible[1]; and many scholars
themselves to the study of an unmanned aerial
vehicle called Quadrotor. Quadrotor is a helicopter
with four rotor wings which give the lift force to
the helicopter. One example is show in Figure
1.The Quadrotor has the helicopter’s characteristics
such as vertical taking-off and vertical landing. The
important characteristics of quadrotor are light and
micro. Now Quadrotor is making an important role
in rescue act, remote inspect task.
Erdinc Altug[2] studied the controller with
visual feedback to quadrotor’s attitude. Samir
Bouadballah[3] gave the differences between PID
controller and LQ controller in an indoor micro
quadrotor. T. Madani and A. Benallegue[4] use
Back-stepping controller to control quadrotor’s
attitude and position. Mehmet Onder Efe[5] use
sliding models to design a robust controller to
quadrotor. This study is to explore the differences
between PID controller and MRAC controller to
quadrotor’s attitude.
) )
=E
<E ;E
2E )
) =Q
<Q ;Q
2Q
Figure 1 Configure of Quadrotor
978-0-7695-4935-4/12 $26.00 © 2012 IEEE
DOI 10.1109/IMCCC.2012.256
Attitude
In section 2 the quadrotor’s dynamics and
model is showed. The PID controller and MRAC
controller are displayed in section 3.In the last
section a simulation is described. The differences
between PID and MRAC are described in section 4.
II. QUADROTOR MODEL
Quadrotor which has four fix angle rotors to
make the lift force is different from common
helicopter. Quadrotor has two flying styles one
called X style and the other called + style.
This study is to describe the + style’s attitude
distribute controller. On + style, rotor 1 and 3 determine the
pitch moment; rotor 2 and 4 determine the roll
moment. The four rotors determine the yaw
moment.
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On the assumption that the frame which fixed
on the quadrotor’s body is E(xb, yb, zb); axis xb is
on the line which is fixed by rotor 1 and 3; axis yb
is on the line which is determined by rotor 2 and 4;
and the zb axis is perpendicular to the plane which
is configured by axis xb and yb. If the speed of
rotor 1 is great than the speed of rotor 3, the pitch
angle is positive. The roll angle is positive when
the speed of rotor 2 is great than rotor 4.If the sum
of rotor 1’s and rotor 3’s speed is great than the
sum of rotor 2 and rotor 4, yaw angle is positive.
The body coordinate frame and navigation
coordinate frame are described in figure 1. This
study assumes these:
1. Quadrotor is rigid body, the center of gravity is
the same as geometric center.
2. The rotors of quadrotor are fixed and
unreformed.
On the assumption in up contents, the equation
of motion of quadrotor is described as next:
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 dx 1
 x2  0 1 x1 0
dx
dt
=    +   u2 (12)
−10 −10 x2 1
U 2 2
 dt
 I xx
 x4 dx 3
0 1 x3 0


dx
dt
=    +   u3 (13)
X  f ( X ,U )   U 3   ˄9˅
I 4 −10 −10 x4 1
 yy dt
 x6
dx 5
0 1 x5 0
U4
dx
dt
=    +   u4 (14)
−10 −10 x6

I zz
6 1
dt

In equation 9, ε=[0, ε2/Ixx, 0, ε3/Iyyˈ0, ε4/Izz].

According to Lyapunov’s law and states
'HVLJQRI3,'FRQWUROOHU feedback, design a MRAC controller. Select
The Laplace Transform of equation 7 like Lyapunov function as equation 15.
equation 10.
V = eT Pe + tr(∅T T1−1 ∅ + φT T2−1 φ) 
1
I xx s 2 ( s )  U 2 ( s )   2 ( s ) 2

I yy s 2 ( s )  U 3 ( s )   3 ( s ) ˄10˅
In equation 15, ∅ = F − Fˈφ = K − K; F is
(15)
I zz s ( s )  U 4 ( s )   4 ( s )
Equation 10 displays that the pole points of
the desire feedback gain, F is the feedback gain. K

quadrotor’s pitch roll and yaw channel are zero; so is the desire feedback gain, K is the feedback gain.
these three channels are not stability. According to Lyapunov’s law, get the feedback
In order to come true stable pitch channel, roll gain F and feed-forward gain K.

−1 )T PexpT dτ + F(0)
channel and yaw channel; this study use PD
F(t) = ∫0 T1 (Bm K
t
controllers like equation 11 describing. (16)

d (cmd   fdk )
−1 )T PerT dτ + K(0)
K(t) = ∫0 T2 (Bm K
t
u 2  k p (cmd   fdk )  k d
dt (17)
d ( cmd   fdk )
u3  k p ( cmd   fdk )  k d 

−1 = Bp ˗
dt In equation 16 and equation 17, P, T1, T2 are
d ( cmd   fdk ) positive definite symmetric matrix; Bm K
u 4  k p ( cmd   fdk )  k d
dt e = xm − xp .

(11) IV. SIMULATIONS AND CONCLUSION

In equation 11, u2 is the output of roll PD These simulations use the parameters from the
controller; the output of pitch PD controller is u3; u4 reference paper 3. Let Ixx = Iyy = 0.0075N/m2 ,
is the output of yaw PD controller. The roll Izz = 0.0013N/m2 . And let k p∅ = k pθ =
proportional gain is kpΦ , differential gain kdΦ .The 5 , k d∅ = k dθ = 1 ; k pφ = 2 ; k dφ = 1.8 ;
pitch proportional gain is kpθ , differential gain is kd H∅ = Hθ = 1ˈHφ = 200. Let the noise power be
θ . The yaw proportional gain is kpψ , differential 0.01. The simulation which use PD controller to
gain is kdψ .The roll pitch and yaw reference inputs quadrotor’s attitude control is displayed in figure 2 ,
are Φ cmd,θ cmd, ψ cmd. And the feedbacks of roll figure 3, figure 4.
pitch and yaw channel are Φ fdk, θ fdk, ψ fdk.
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MRAC controller design is a method which
uses a model to design an adaptive controller[8].
MRAC controller can make the states or outputs of
object approach to the states or outputs of the
model. This study select three model described in

equation 12, equation 13 and equation 14 for pitch Figure 2 Roll channel simulation of PD
roll and yaw channel.

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